At Your Command! The Price of Freedom

synopsis

This documentary series follows an elite Czech military chemical defence unit during its six-month deployment at a NATO base, offering access to places normally off limits to civilians. Among the hundred soldiers serving in Lithuania are military medic Martin, Jan—the Czech Army’s first Czech-Mexican soldier - decontamination specialist Martin, logistics specialist Filip, rifleman Jakub and chaplain David. Russia’s Zapad 2025 military exercise is underway near the Belarusian border. Russian drones breach Lithuanian airspace. The Czech soldiers practise survival skills with Norwegian specialists and undergo combat medical training, including simulations of severe bleeding and amputations. In a “kill house” training facility, they practise combat tactics inside buildings under fire. Christmas away from loved ones deepens their homesickness. News agency reports reveal Europe’s role in the war in Ukraine and the shifting stance of the United States. Drone footage evokes the new reality of warfare: tanks, the internet, cyberattacks and disinformation. What lies behind the lofty rhetoric of national defence? Is it harder to lose freedom and win it back, or to safeguard it and keep it?

biography

Czech screenwriter, photographer and author Benjamin Tuček gained his first significant professional experience as assistant director for Saša Gedeon’s Return of the Idiot (1999). He debuted in 2002 with Děvčátko, a surrealist story from a Prague housing estate. His achieved his greatest acclaim as the screenwriter for the internationally successful Protektor (Marek Najbrt, 2009) or as a director of the documentary film The Plan (2014). Tuček has also published the short story collection Very Short Waves (2009) and helped create the TV series Therapy (2011).

film details

director:

Benjamin Tuček